


for when the light has hit the ground

by ships_to_sail



Category: Mary Poppins (Movies)
Genre: F/M, First Kiss, Fluff, Magic, Pining, childhood crush
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-16
Updated: 2019-12-16
Packaged: 2021-02-26 01:07:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,835
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21824899
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ships_to_sail/pseuds/ships_to_sail
Summary: "Mary Poppins knows just a little bit of everything, my boy,” Bert says cheerily.She nods her head slightly at Bert, a demure smile on her face. “Not everything, thank you, but quite enough about the things that matter.” And then she catches Jack’s eye and becomes serious. She looks from him to the back of the blonde-haired girl, and when she speaks her voice feels full of command, though no less kind. “She’s going to need a good deal of magic growing up, I’m afraid, and she’s not inclined to it. See that she does the best she can, won’t you dear?”
Relationships: Jane Banks/Jack
Comments: 6
Kudos: 52
Collections: Yuletide 2019





	for when the light has hit the ground

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Carmilla](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Carmilla/gifts).



> for the delightful Carmilla, who I hope enjoys this little bit of magical nonsense

To an eight-year-old, the thin iron lamposts of London seem to stretch forever into the sky. Jack gazes up at them as he skips along behind Bert, trying desperately to juggle the man's chimney sweeping equipment. Bert's promised to get him work with the leeries as soon as he turns 10, but two years feels like an eternity to wait. So he spends the days following Bert, slipping into the thinner chimneys, and daydreaming. 

He's on one of his last two trips with Bert when he sees them both for the first time. The first is a girl who looks like she's his age. She's got yellow hair that cascades over her shoulders and curls at the ends, and her smile is infectious. She leans over and whispers something to her brother and laughs, the sound bright and clear like a bell. He wants to capture the sound like lamplight, so he can turn it up and make it come alive whenever he wants. But she's dressed in a pale yellow dress and her brother is in a proper waistcoat and they're both following their father, Mr. Banks, who Jack knows works at a bank. He's the kind of people Jack's own dad would've called 'proper toff', but Jack can feel the pull of her on his feet, a gravity all her own.

He's just considering dropping Bert's tools and running after her when he sees the second woman walk out of the house. This woman Bert seems to know, and he greets her with a wave and a smile.

"Mary Poppins, as I live and breathe." And this woman is beautiful, too, but in a different way. In a way that reminds Jack of his mum, which makes his eyes prick with tears, especially when she looks at him with kindness in her eyes.

"Hello Bert. Hello Jack."

"How do you know my name?"

"Mary Poppins knows just a little bit of everything, my boy,” Bert says cheerily, clapping him on the shoulder and tipping his hat at the woman, who is dressed in a high-necked starched blouse and a blue wool riding outfit. She’s carrying a parrot umbrella and her voice sounds warm, like bread from the oven.

She nods her head slightly at Bert, a demure smile on her face. “Not everything, thank you, but quite enough about the things that matter.” And then she catches Jack’s eye and becomes serious. She looks from him to the back of the blonde-haired girl, and when she speaks her voice feels full of command, though no less kind. “She’s going to need a good deal of magic growing up, I’m afraid, and she’s not inclined to it. See that she does the best she can, won’t you dear?”

Jack has no idea what the woman’s talking about. Except, he kind of does. He’s seen Bert disappear into his chalkings, seen women with orange hair walking across the ceiling, watched carousel ponies leave their posts and parade across the countryside. He’d seen it all, because he believed he’d seen it all, and what other truth could there be? At 10, he was just learning that some people didn’t quite think like that, didn’t see the same magic in the world that he could see. And the idea that the blonde-haired, beautiful laughed girl could be one of those people made his heart hurt in a way that was far too familiar to someone his age. 

So he nods his head solemnly and, at ten, speaks the words that will ultimately change his life, “I promise.”

She looks at him a second longer and then smiles, her face splitting with a radiant grin. “There’s a good lad.” She steps forward and kisses Bert lightly on the cheek, opening her umbrella. And then she’s floating away on the wind, another bit of magic for Jack’s collection. 

*

He waves at the blonde girl when he sees her in the window. He slips behind her group of friends as they walk home from school in the early evening, blending into the dusk and dirt of the city bricks behind him. He tries his best not to follow her, because he’s not interested in frightening her, but he can’t help but be drawn to her. As she grows, her hair begins to darken, just a bit, and a knowing light shows up in her eyes and the corner of her smile. Jack’s sad at that, and he remembers what Mary Poppins said about magic, and being able to see it.

So he tries to remind her. He leaves her freshly polished apples on the windowsill and little bundles of wildflowers in her bike basket during the spring. He tries to think of a way to let her know it’s him, but he never can, and he doesn’t know who she thinks all these little gifts are coming from. Maybe she doesn’t think about it, and just assumes that’s how life provides for Jane Banks. 

But then she goes away to college, and when she comes back she’s in pants and vests, up reading by the window so late into the night that she’s still awake when Jack comes to dim the lamps for the day. She walks with her head down and her smiles aren’t as visible on the streets anymore. She still goes out with her brother, still leans over and whispers in his ear like a pair of conspirators. But now a second woman goes with them, and just as often her brother leans over to this woman instead. There are wedding bells, and christening bells, and the Banks house is a happy house, even if Jack sees Jane around less and less.

Until the day a Tuesday in April comes to pass and Jack watches in solemnity as the funeral procession marches by. Black crepe covers the doorknobs and dark curtains fill the windows and there is a feeling of sorrow on the block that overcomes Jack every time he comes to take care of the lamps. His heart breaks for them, and he wishes there were a kind of small magic in the world that could undo it all. But there isn’t, and he can’t, so instead he consoles himself with making the Banks children smile when he can. He sees them at the market, occasionally, with the blonde woman who he hardly ever sees smile anymore.

She's becoming quite the serious presence in his world in a way he doesn't expect when he starts to hear the whispers about SPRUCE growing into murmurs. The group's agitation for better pay and working conditions for the youngest chimney sweeps strike at a part of Jack he rarely has need to feel. And when he sees her at the soup kitchen, ladling lamb stew and talking with some of his dearest friends, he sees a fire in her eyes that makes his palms itch to reach out and touch her.

By the time Mary Poppins returns to his life, he's smitten. He chases her niece and nephews across the park and pulls Georgie out of the sky and brings them all a woman on the end of a kite.

"Mary Poppins, as I live and breathe."

*

"You know, Miss Jane, I was wondering if it would be alright with you - that is, would you mind terribly if I, um, well. Can I walk you to the SPRUCE meeting this evening?"

He's stuttering and stammering and blushing so fiercely in the early summer evening that he wants to rewind to their balloon adventure a hundred feet in the air and float away for good. He's so busy wringing his hat in his hands he almost misses the tinge of pink that settles in her cheeks, as well.

Almost.

"That would be lovely, Jack." She draws out the 'a' in his name like she enjoys the feel of it in her mouth, and Jack wants to swoon. But leeries don't swoon, they dazzle, so Jack nods at her directly, his smile as radiant as hers used to be, and he gives her a little bow. He turns on his heel and walks away and already his brain is making a plan.

*

He’s standing outside her door promptly at 5:00, giving them a half hour to walk to the meeting hall and socialize before the meeting begins. He knows she likes to do this, takes a great deal of comfort and pride in learning the names and stories of first time attendees, checking in with return members as their cause grows. It’s a side of herself that her family doesn’t always get to see, powerful and in charge, and it thrills him in a different kind of way than the bright smiles and the love towards her niece and nephews.

She steps out of the door wearing the same slacks she wore to the park earlier that day, but she’s changed into a dark blue shirt with silvered buttons and cap sleeves, some kind of stitching along the sides that draws Jack’s eye to the shape of her body, the way she moves through the space between them, and he cannot wait for the night ahead.

The walk to the meeting is slow and unhurried. The summer air around them is warm and there’s the smallest breeze that smells like lavender and summer bonfires off the Thames.

“And then she was just gone!” Jane finishes explaining the mysterious disappearance of Mary Poppins - again - just as they reach the meeting hall.

“That’ll always be her way, I expect,” he says. “She disappeared when I was a boy, too, just like that. Poof, gone into thin air. Like magic, she is.”

“Oh, right. I always forget you’ve met her before. What was she like?”

“Much the same as she is now, really. She seemed much taller then, of course.” Jane’s giggle rings through his bones like a shock. “But even then, she was kind. Wise. Always looking out for folks. Telling other people to look out for folks.”

“Is that what she told you to do?”

Jack swallows and won’t meet Jane’s eyes. He smiles. “You know, I’m not sure I remember exactly.” It’s a lie, and they both know it’s a lie, but at that moment Ms. Lovett and Mr. Farrow walk up to them to discuss distributing the next round of educational pamphlets and Jane is all business for the next two hours. Jack sits in the back corner and watches, chatting with Geoffrey and Matthew and Sarah and half a dozen other lamplighters, street cleaners, and flower vendors who’ve come to gather on behalf of all those in London having to do without. He speaks candidly and enthusiastically and he gets a little chill every time he hears Jane’s name. There are things changing in the world around them, and Jack feels like he’s standing in the middle of a pinwheel. It’s an exhilarating feeling, but occasionally it catches him off-guard and threatens to unmoor him. He pats his back pocket and feels the outline of the candle and flint he always carries and it grounds him, reminds him that some things never change. 

He and Jane stay until the last of the chairs are stacked and put away, working on opposite sides of the room in little groups of three and four, the names and numbers shifting as different members get tired and head for home, or to the pub for a round of drinks. Jack is just shaking hands with the blacksmith’s new apprentice, Benjamin, when Jane walks up to his elbow with a small sigh and a tired small.

“Shall we, then?”

He holds his arm out to her and she loops hers with his, pulling her hand into her stomach so he’s forced to walk pressed tightly up against her. He can feel the heat of her through his clothes and it feels intimate and illicit, even as all they do is walk out of the hall and to his bike, sat against the lamp post opposite. He helps her on and then pauses to ask her the question that could break his heart.

“Would it be okay if we made a stop on the way home?”

“A stop? A stop where?”

“Nowhere untoward, Miss Jane, I can promise you.” He doesn’t mean for his voice to go low and rough, but it’s the first promise he’s ever had the occasion to make her, and that means a lot to Jack. 

“Jane, please. Do call me Jane, Jack. And we can stop, if you’d like. Assuming we can still be back to the house by nine so I can see the children before they go to bed?”

“Wouldn’t miss it,” he says with a wink, and before he can say anything else that will give the game away, he hops onto the bike seat and peddles them towards home. They’re almost to her house when he takes a sharp left down a small garden alley near the Admiral’s house. It’s a short brick pathway between two buildings that leads to a stone courtyard much like the one he’d taken her to for the leerie dance, but smaller by a third. There’s a fountain bubbling in the middle, and a single bench on the far wall, and little else but silence and starlight and the ivy clinging to the brick around them.

“Oh, Jack,” she says his name with a little gasp, and Jack reaches out and grasps her hand in the dark. She squeezes his hand in return and his heart soars. He pulls her gently behind him to the bench, sitting them both down and pulling the candle out of his back pocket. He reaches underneath the bench and gropes around for a few seconds until his hand hits cool metal. He puts the tin can on the bench next to him. He strikes the flint a few times before it catches the wick of the candle, and he has to squint in the sudden light.

“Sorry,” he murmurs, covering the small flame with his hand so that it doesn’t hurt her eyes. He lowers it into the center of the curved metal and waits a few seconds until he can pour a small pool of wax onto the wooden bench beneath. Once the candle is upright, he stands by and lets the flame grow until it shines through the cutouts in the tin can, throwing shadows on the wall and surrounding them with a menagerie of candlelit creatures.

Jane’s eyes grow wide and Jack beams at her. All around them, painted in flickering candle light on the brick and ivy, are bears and horses, tigers and peacocks and serpents that stretch and bend and seem to dance through the air around them. Jane’s eyes can’t seem to find a point to focus on, and she reaches a hand across the bench to Jack’s. He slips his palm against hers, twining their fingers together and does his best to carve this moment into his memory forever. 

As they sit and watch, the animals begin to move in a way that the candlelight can’t quite explain. The bears pull up onto their toes and turn pirouettes; the peacocks open and close their plumage, while Jack swears he can hear the low rumble of a tiger’s growl echo in the enclosed space. Horses gallop and prance in twos and threes, abandoning their solitary placement, and the snakes warp and wrap and form themselves into starbursts that Jane is tempted to reach out and touch, by the way Jack sees her fingers twitch. Instead, the hand he isn’t holding comes to rest against her lips, and she finally looks at him, her eyes shining.

“How is this happening?”

“One thing you should know about Mary Poppins, she never explains anything,” he jokes, and Jane laughs. 

When she stops, she looks at him with eyes that seem sharper. “What did Mary Poppins tell you, when you were a boy?”

Jack swallows and meets her eyes, his thumb beginning to rub against the back of Jane’s hand. “She pointed to this right beautiful young girl and told me she’d need help seeing the magic in this world. And that it was my job to help her find it when she lost it. Asked me to promise.”

“And did you?” Jane’s voice is barely above a whisper.

“‘Course I did, Jane Banks,” Jack looks down at where their hands and pressed together, her pale skin glowing in the candlelight, his fingertips dirty where they poke out the ends of his fingerless gloves. “Anything to make you smile.”

He doesn’t see her smile, then, but he feels it when she catches his mouth with hers. His empty hand comes up to rest on her cheek as her other hand wraps around his neck and they lean into each other, their outline thrown into relief on the wall behind them, joining the shadowed magic Jack had created for the both of them.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from "Underneath the Lovely London Sky"


End file.
